


don't read the last page (i stay)

by notalone91



Series: LoserFest 2021 [8]
Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Adult Losers Club (IT), Domestic Fluff, First Kiss, If You Squint - Freeform, Love Confessions, M/M, Minor Ben Hanscom/Beverly Marsh, Minor Bill Denbrough/Mike Hanlon, Much like Jack Sparrow I have thrown canon off of my ship thank you, Post-IT Chapter Two (2019), loserfest2021, oh my god they were roommates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-14 22:01:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29303142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notalone91/pseuds/notalone91
Summary: Newly Divorced Eddie moved in with Richie.  Now, he has quite a bit to say.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Series: LoserFest 2021 [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2138544
Comments: 4
Kudos: 61





	don't read the last page (i stay)

**Author's Note:**

> Day 8: Inspired by a track from Reputation (New Year's Day)

Late at night after their big New Years' blowout, their house was in shambles. It was a swamp of glitter, streamers, cups, and polaroids. Furniture had been left askew. It was the first time since Richie had agreed to let Eddie move in that he fully regretted having let go of the housekeeper, at Eddie’s request. Who was he to let his roommate make that decision anyway? Bringing in the last of the items for the dishwasher, he called across the center island. “Eduardo! What's cookin', good lookin'?” 

“Our friends are disgusting,” he answered without hesitation, stuffing another handful of beer bottles into the trash bag. “You are aware of that, right? Like, look at this!” He moved to Richie and handed him a pint glass full of floaters. “Bill needs to figure out how to drink without spitting it back into his glass.”

Richie snickered. “It's not his fault I'm hysterical,” he joked. He didn’t even have to look to see that he was getting a Look from Eddie. “Especially when you give me so much fodder.”

With a sigh, he added “And, yes, Beverly, I get that your alcohol tolerance is higher than any of ours but do you have to give your husband a reason to create a skyscraper on the coffee table?” and knocked a stack of bottles into the bag. Momentarily, he was prepared to admit that it was impressive if it wasn’t disgusting. He eyed a water ring mere inches away from the stack of coasters and groaned, making a note of it.

“She's his muse. It's cute,” he said with a shrug. He washed his hands and went on to put away the extra blankets and pillows. “Wish I had a muse,” he grumbled.

Eddie gave a snort of a laugh. “You don’t need a muse. You just need to sit down and write.” 

In the middle of folding the largest blanket, he stopped. He turned back to him with a wicked smile. “Will you be my muse, Eds?” He swung the blanket around his waist and pulled him in. Eddie simply spluttered in response. “See, it's that right there,” he said, pointing at him.

“What? That I can't come up with a retort for your stupidity sometimes?” he asked, ducking out of the wrappings deftly. He moved away, collecting up the last of the bottles in the living room. “I'm nobody's muse. I'm divorced and newly gay.”

“I don't know that you're newly-”

Waving his hands exaggeratedly, he clarified, “Newly out, then.” He dropped them down into the bag and, finally, tied it off. He moved to the door and continued moping. “And I have had a string of bad dates because they all feel like cheap imitations of what I actually want.” As soon as he said it, he winced. He hadn’t realized he was going to say that until it was already out.

Richie shook out the next blanket and started folding it. “Which is?”

Now that the conversation was open, Eddie realized that it was his moment. If he didn’t say it, he might not ever get the chance or the nerve to do it again. “This,” he said, cursing himself for his inability to cover his own ass. “Cleaning up after our friends trash our house, and arguing, and quiet midnights, and,” he folded his arms protectively, “coming home to the one person I want to spend time with more than anyone else. It's-” he looked down at the pile of polaroids on the coffee table and zeroed in on it. 

Beverly had taken it. She’d been sitting between Bill and Eddie when Mike decided that it was a travesty that Richie was the only one in the room that had seen The Full Monty and stood up to do his best impression of the You Can Leave Your Hat On dance. Everyone else was busy watching their friend make a fool of himself but, bless him, Mike had nothing on Ben. Her attention, instead, was stuck on Bill’s dopey heart eyes. She knew the look. Once upon a time, she’d been on the receiving end of those looks. She snapped the picture to prove a point to him. She probably didn’t expect to be proving a point to Eddie as well.

“Look. Look at this picture of Bill from earlier.” He crossed to Richie and shoved it at him. “I want this.” Richie raised a finger, opening his mouth to interject. “Not Bill. That expression. That feeling. I want to be so in love that even in a picture, you can tell I'm looking at the love of my life.”

Richie’s shoulders slumped and he shook his head sympathetically. “You can have all of that, Eds. It's been a hell of a year,” he leaned against the arm of the sofa and softened. “No one in their right mind would jump headfirst into a serious relationship right out of a divorce stemmed from what we went through.”

That wasn’t what he meant. Eddie groaned and stomped his foot. “OPEN YOUR EYES, RICHIE!” The taller man jolted in shock. Eddie couldn’t believe he was going to have to actually lay it all out on the line. For someone who was usually quick to pick up on the slightest hint of a dirty joke, he couldn’t get this?

Blinking a couple of times to check, Richie slowly started, “They are-

“I want you, you absolute asshole,” he shouted, throwing his hands up desperately. He began to pace, starting and stopping his explanation once or twice, but secretly hoping that Richie might save him the embarrassment and interject. "It's not that I want those things," he shook his head in an attempt to clear it. Why was this so hard? He never had a hard time talking to Richie about anything. But this was different. Just because they were both into men in some capacity didn’t mean that they were obligated to be into each other. That made him sound like the 65-year-old idiot at his firm whose first response to his coming out was to immediately sit down and cross his legs while saying that it was cool as long as he didn’t hit on him. It wasn’t like that. He found himself starting to ramble mindlessly. "I mean, I do. I want those things. But I want them with you," he said, guiding himself back on track. We know each other better than anyone. Looking at you makes me feel…" a thousand cheesy movie clichés ran through his head. He'd hated Jerry Maguire from the first time he saw it, but now, it was the only thing that came to his mind. "I don't know. You stop my heart and start it all at the same time. I laugh harder with you than I laugh with anyone else, and not just because it's your job," he said, hearing the incoming comment a mile away and cutting it right off. He nudged Richie over and leaned against the arm with him. Still, he could do no more than stare at the pattern he was digging with his toe as he spoke. "You're the single most incredible person I know, Rich. Whenever something happens, I look to see what you think, if you're laughing. When I think back on the last year, being here with you is what I want the rest of my life to be." Finally willing himself to look up at Richie, he found that he was already staring at him, still clearly stunned with just a hint of- something Eddie couldn't quite put his finger on.. "Even more than that, I think this is how it was always supposed to be." He knocked his knee gently against Richie's and moved his hand almost imperceptibly closer to Richie’s, too. "The music stopped and you're the only one I want to be left standing with."

However small the movement was, Richie had noticed. He noticed everything. And why wouldn’t he when all he’d wanted for the portions of his life that included Eddie was to be closer to him? He slid his hand over Eddie’s and stared at the way they fit together. Like they were made for each other. “I suck at this. You know that, right?” He gave a quiet laugh and pulled their hands up to allow himself to press up against Eddie’s hip. “I'm terrible at the courtship and the romance and the communication.”

Historically, that was true. Especially with guys. He found himself tripping over his words and everything came out wrong all the time. Once, a relationship had only lasted a little more than 3 dates because he had, stupidly, mentioned his preference for smaller guys. What he meant was somewhere in the vicinity of 5’8” but lie and say that they’re 5’9” who I can stand behind at a concert with my arms around to sing terribly in their ear and still see over. What he said, however, was that he had a thing for little people. How was he supposed to know that the guy’s mother was a little person? 

That wasn’t something he was likely to repeat with Eddie. He knew everything about Eddie and the stuff he didn’t know, he was happy to learn. And the courtship, he was happy to do. He often found himself daydreaming about taking him to little cafes and Disneyland and everything in between, holding hands and kissing and being as disgustingly obnoxious as they could manage.

Still, he worried about the way that it could all come crashing down. “I freeze up. I don't communicate well. I hide everything under a carefully crafted veil of humor to make it all seem a little less obvious.” These were traits that were appealing and even endearing in his twenties. They were even okay into his early thirties for fuckbuddies and casual dating. But, as an adult, he settled on, “I'm a mess.”

Eddie smiled and closed his other hand around Richie’s leaning his head on his shoulder. “Be my mess,” he insisted.

“An interesting proposition from someone who was complaining about our friends being slobs like 5 minutes ago,” he laughed. Eddie, however, didn’t. He balked. “You're serious?” His only response was a nod. “Don't joke with me about this because I don't- I don't know if I can handle that.”

“Why would I joke? I think…” He took a deep breath and simply gazed into his eyes. “I think it's supposed to be you and me.”

“Can… Is this where we kiss? Is this that part?” Richie asked. His face was just about to Eddie’s, one strong hand along the side of his neck. He rested their foreheads together asking for permission.

Shaking his head, Eddie pulled back with a smile. “You haven't said yes yet.”

Richie’s jaw dropped wide. “You haven't asked me anything!” 

That wasn’t exclusively true. Sure, Eddie hadn’t phrased anything as a question, but he had made himself clear. Still, in the interest of good communication, he added, “I don't kiss people I'm not in a relationship with.”

“That's a pretty stringent rule,” Richie noted. He couldn’t count the number of people he’d kissed and never seen again. Despite getting the point, he had to take a dig. “No wonder the knock-off versions of me were so short-lived.”

Eddie coughed out a laugh. “I never said-”

Wrinkling his nose so hard that his glasses edged up his face, Richie made a high pitched noise, then slid into a pointed, “Ya did, though.” Cheap imitations of what he wanted, when what he wanted was Richie, was, indeed, a knock-off Richie by proxy. Might as well have been a card table on a Times Square street corner selling purses and sneakers. 

“Whatever,” he sighed. He couldn’t believe that he was making him be this explicit about it. 

Truly, Richie just wanted to hear him say it. He needed to hear him say it or he wouldn’t believe it was happening. “So?”

Eddie mumbled softly, “Doyouwanttotryactuallybeingtogether?

“I'm sorry? I didn't quite catch that,” Richie asked with a croaky, old man voice, cupping his hand to his ear. 

He pushed himself off the couch and took both of Richie’s hands in his own. “Do you want to try actually being together? Like as a couple?” he asked, realizing that he sounded too much like a kid for his own comfort. 

Richie smiled and pulled Eddie flush to him. “Not only do I want to try, I'll even skip the trial period,” he leaned in and, with their lips just a fraction of an inch apart. “I think I want the lifetime subscription,” he added in his most sultry, Lifetime Movie man voice. 

Before he could even manage to land the kiss, Eddie bust out laughing. With his head back, laughing loudly, Richie felt himself fall even faster. “What the fuck,” Eddie said through fits of giggles before finally managing to align their lips for their first kiss. "You're such a dick."


End file.
